We Live in Cairo

ABOUT

Book, Music & Lyrics by The Lazours
Directed by Taibi Magar
Fall 2024

2024/25 Season

Read Synopsis

Inspired by the young Egyptians who took to the streets amidst the throes of the Arab Spring, We Live in Cairo follows six student activists using their street art, photography and song to overthrow a regime older than they are. Winner of the Richard Rodgers Award for Musical Theater, this soaring new musical from Jonathan Larson Grant winners and NYTW Usual Suspects Daniel & Patrick Lazour journeys from the jubilation of the Tahrir Square protests through the aftermath of the years that followed. As escalating division and violence lead to a military crackdown, the young revolutionaries of Cairo must weigh the cost of how—or even whether—to keep their dreams of change alive. Obie Award winner and NYTW Usual Suspect Taibi Magar (The Half-God of Rainfall) directs.

We Live in Cairo is produced by special arrangement with Madison Wells Live.

The world premiere of We Live in Cairo was produced by the American Repertory Theater (Diane Paulus, Artistic Director; Diane Borger, Executive Producer).

We Live in Cairo was presented at the National Alliance for Musical Theatre’s Festival of New Musicals in 2016.

We Live in Cairo was developed during a residency at the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center’s National Music Theatre Conference in 2015 (Preston Whiteway, Executive Director; Paulette Haupt, Artistic Director).

We Live in Cairo was developed, in part, at SPACE on Ryder Farm.

Taibi Magar / Director

Taibi Magar is an Artistic Director of Philadelphia Theatre Company. As a freelance director, her most recent credits are: Half-God of Rainfall (NYTW), Help (The Shed) and Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992 (Signature Theatre, Lortel Award Best Revival). Other NY credits include: Capsule by Whitney White and Peter Mark Kendall (Under the Radar Festival/The Public Theater, co-directed with Tyler Dobrowsky) Blue Ridge starring Marin Ireland and The Great Leap starring BD Wong (Atlantic Theater Company); Is God Is (Soho Rep, 2018 Obie Award;) Master (The Foundry); and Underground Railroad Game (Ars Nova, Obie Award). Regional: CTG, Woolly Mammoth Theatre, Shakespeare Theatre, Alley Theatre, The Guthrie Theater, and Seattle Repertory Theatre, among others. International: Hamburg Festival, Edinburgh Festival, Malthouse Theatre (Melbourne), and Soho Theatre (London). MFA: Brown University 

 

The Lazours / Book, Music & Lyrics

Daniel and Patrick Lazour are brothers and music theatre writers. Projects in development include a musical adaptation of Ritesh Batra’s film The Lunchbox (Lincoln Center Theater) and their show with communal singing, Night Side Songs (Under the Radar, PTC/A.R.T. co-production). They wrote original music for Caroline Lindy’s debut feature, Your Monster (Sundance 2024) and their movie musical Challenger: An American Dream is being developed with Bruce Cohen Productions and Spark Features. Their musical We Live in Cairo had its first production at American Repertory Theater in 2019, directed by Taibi Magar. Original songs by the Lazours can be heard on their independently released albums: Freres, Flap My Wings (Songs from We Live in Cairo),Beth’s Homemade Cowboy Breakfast and Lullabies. They are Jonathan Larson Grant and Richard Rodgers Award recipients, MacDowell and Yaddo Fellows, and New York Theater Workshop Usual Suspects. They have worked with Noor Theatre Company, Ars Nova and PAC NYC, and are proud teaching artists. Patrick holds a B.A. from Boston College and Daniel holds a B.A. from Columbia University. @frereslazour

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